10/30/09

Last night I took the requisite night-time walk around the neighborhood. I do not consider myself a resident of any particular place until I have accomplished a night-time stroll. I believe this tradition started when I was very little, and my Dad would come get me out of bed and take me on long walks around the neighborhood. Sometimes we would even drive to other neighborhoods, just to see what they looked like at night. One time, after a huge snow-storm, we bundled up in all our snow clothes and walked through the cemetery by our house. I remember that the moon was very bright, and the snow glittered, and that we kept bumping into gravestones and memorial benches buried under the snow.

My mother knew nothing of this tradition until 3rd grade, when I wrote a short story about waiting for my mom to go to bed so my dad could come take me on a walk. I titled my short story "Moonshadow,"* and at the time, my mother was understandably annoyed with my father, having discovered both the cause of my early-morning grumpiness, and of my habit for my falling asleep in class.

Now I live in my own neighborhood, and take walks by myself. My father searched in vain for a replacement co-walker, but failed. My siblings are an unreliable bunch. ** Sometimes, we call each other around 11:00 pm and meet each other for walks. Sometimes, I will be walking, and a car will pull up next to me. It always freaks me out until I realize it is my Dad.

THE END.

*After the Cat Stevens song, of course.

**Except for now, my youngest brother Clark goes with him. I think Clark, being the most intelligent of my siblings, realized that there may be a direct correlation between money left to children in wills, and the regularity that said children participate in walks. So well played, Clark. Your motives might not be pure, but your ambition is admirable.

I am pleased to report that our neighborhood seems very night-time walk friendly.

10/26/09

1. You post an alarming number of shoe pictures. Extra points for bowed-in toes, grandma shoes, and if the angle allows us to see just the hem of your vintage dress.

2. Bright lipstick plays an unusually large role in your concept of self-identity.

3. You post more than 5 photos of nearly identical "self portraits" in each post.

4. Said photos are Polaroids, or have been altered to appear like Polaroids.

5. You are under age 90, but like to give "advice" on topics like marriage, happiness, or love.

6. You have "sponsors", not ads on the side of your three column blog.*

7. You need those columns to fit all your buttons, and "sponsors" for shabby apple and random etsy stores.

8. I can't tell you apart from any of your peers.

9. You say "vintage" and "thrifting" like some people say "the" or "and."

10. Ironic fake glasses play an important role in your life.**

There. I said it. Socialists are not going to take over the world. Neither are Communists. It won't be blood sucking vampires, or brain-hungry zombies. It will be adorable little clones with perky lipstick. Be on the wary, good citizens.

*Can't take credit for this concept. As my friend Gurr would say, Causes (breast cancer, children in underdeveloped countries,) have sponsors. Bloggers have Ads.

10/24/09

I don't think I have ever mentioned this before (along with my home address, where I work, and photos of my students, oh wait, that is NORMAL,) anyway, I don't think I have shared my deep and abiding love of skeletons with the internet.

I love skeletons. I am wearing skeletons pajama pants right now. (Don't judge me, I have the swine flu.)

I think my love started back in high school, on a family trip to Mexico. We went into town one evening, and I discovered entire shops filled with skeleton figures, skeleton shadow-box things, skeleton dishes.....and the list goes on. Even better, all of these skeletons were covered in glitter. GLITTER AND SKELETONS. BE STILL MY BEATING HEART.

Anyway, since then, I have been randomly collecting skeleton memorabilia, and an embarrassing amount of it ends up on my mantel. (Until Spouseman mysteriously finds a new home for them, and replaces my dead skeleton friends with a statue of Jesus. Hurmph.**)

My favorite piece of skeleton memorabilia looks somewhat like this:*

Except in my version, the girl skeleton is a bride, and she is PREGNANT. WHAT IS NOT TO LOVE????????????

Anyway, the point of the story is this:*** Yesterday, I went to work feeling like I had been run over by a tractor, and unusually grumpy.First period drags on for 3 years as I try to coax my students to please, please participate in a class discussion. Afterwards, I leave the classroom ask a teacher a question, and when I come back, most of my second period class is already seated, and they are freakishly quiet. Suddenly, one of them shouts "Mrs. L! GO LOOK ON YOUR DESK!"

And what to my wondering eyes should appear? A series of clay skeleton skulls, covered in glitter and paint.

My students had made them in art class, and gifted them to me. Including a skull that said "To Mrs. L" in GLITTER along the top.

Dear Students,

I totally forgive you for giving me the swine flu.

The End.

*Could I have taken a photo of my own skeletons myself, and posted it? Sure. But that would require way more time than I am willing to invest. Plus, this forces you to use your imagination.

** How exactly am I supposed to argue with that? Dear Spouseman, I believe my skeleton obsession is more worthy of mantle space than a statue of Jesus.

*** Yes. I went to work with the Swine Flu. I know. I know. Won't happen again.

10/20/09

and my personal favorite, judgeymcjudgerston. This one can be a noun (as in a title of a person,) or, the way I usually employ it, as an adjective, "She was being totally judgeymcjudgerston at me."*

In other news, subbing today totally sucked. I hate subbing, but I feel obligated to do it since I only teach every other day. (Remember the block schedule? I teach on B days.) Anyway, today I subbed at a junior high, and the teacher DID NOT LEAVE ANY LESSON PLANS. Just a classroom full of hyper 7th graders who were very inclined to throw things at each-other, and also wrestle.

I managed to find a video, and make up some random assignments, but still, freaking teachers, LEAVE PLANS.

In other news, I am really tired of people (fellow bloggers, the media, society, insert scapegoat here, ________) telling me what I do and do not like based on my gender. Lines such as "I love __________ because it makes me feel like a woman." or "My husband does ___________ and it is so manly."

Sigh. I hate to sound like your Gender Studies 101 professor, but sex is biological, gender is a social construct. In other words, we make this crap up. We say girls wear pink and boys wear blue, and girls like to bake, and boys like to shoot things, and all of it is bull crap. You like pink because you like pink (or because our culture tells you that you like pink, ) not because you have a vagina.

And don't even comment telling me that there are differences between men and women that wire women to like baking, and men to like shooting. I acknowledge that men and women are both psychologically and physically different. I simply don't agree with (or understand the desire to,) genderize things like colors, activities, professions, or feelings. ("Men aren't nurturing**" being my most rage-inducing typically gendered feeling.)

That is all for today, class. Remember the midterm next Friday.

*Shout out to James, who I believed witnessed the birth of that particular linguistic gem.

** Have you met Dan? He is an entirely more competent human being when it comes to nurturing. I, on the other hand, have way to much rage to nurture effectively.

10/19/09

1. I got a hair-cut recently that makes me feel a little too retro-ish for my own good. I am not cool enough for this hair. I am cool enough for sloppy English teacher ponytails. Also, I am not smart enough in the morning to operate a hair-straightener, or apply product.

2. Also, I wore a very ruffled sweater today. I could help thinking that my sweater was exploding, and that the ruffles were it's intestines.

3. Had lunch with the rage-luncher friend, the Gurrbonzo, who is in town from damn Iowa. I may live to age 30 now, that is how therapeutic our rage lunch was.

4. Let's go back to the superficial. I have no concept of style. See item #2. Lots of people say this, and are lying, but I am telling the truth. Rage luncher friend and I both had gift cards to fancy 9th and 9th stores, and friend made a killing and I just struggled. Friend tried to assist, but I'm afraid I'm a desperate case. What is cute? What is cute on me? What is cute in my house? I'm fairly certain owner of said 9th and 9th store thinks I am a moron, because this is the second time I have visited her store, and not been able to make a decision.

Who would like to volunteer to shop for me? It would be like service. Please leave contact information in comments or via email. I'm only a little kidding.

5. Tomorrow is a happy day, because the teacher I am subbing for called to inform me that I don't have to come until 9. Blessed, blessed 9 am, when regular people go to work. Blessed.

6. Did I tell you? I made the cutest infant and toddler skirt set for Gurrbonzo, who already has one cute daughter, and is having another in January. I really should have photographed them, because they were awesome. I used this tutorial, for the toddler, and adapted it for the infant. Infant skirt was so tiny and adorable and small, I wanted to steal a baby off the street so I could dress it.

10/16/09

Fun note: I went to publish a bunch of comments, and accidentally deleted them instead. So if your comment wasn't published, don't take it personally, I'm just incapable today.

I am rendered incapacitated by rage.

Observe:

There was a faculty meeting this week in which the principal had to remind teachers about appropriate facebook behavior. Apparently, we needed to be reminded to

1. Not accept friend requests from students.

2. Not SEND friend requests TO students.

I am disgusted that this is actually an issue. Are you kidding me? Oh wait. My former mentor teacher did that all the time.................

Also on the agenda, a reminder to not post pictures of your students on the internet*, and to refrain from asking students for their cell-phone numbers, or giving out yours. If you need to contact the MINORS** you teach, you can reach them via THEIR PARENTS AND LEGAL GUARDIANS.

By the end of all this, I was ashamed for humanity, and teachers in general. REALLY GUYS, REALLY?

* That includes posting photos of your students on your "personal blog," you morons. Nothing enrages me like seeing a blog where some 20-something 1st grade teacher has posted a slew of photos of her students. LOOK AT MY CUTE 1ST GRADERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Inevitably, these people will also post photos of their school, or mention what school they work at in their profile.

Why don't you just look up all the sex offenders in your area, and invite them to your first grade class? Because when you post photos of kids who are not yours on the internet, and provide information on where they will be everyday, that is basically what you are doing.

**I think young teachers of teenagers forget that their students are MINORS and not potential "friends." You don't need their number, they don't need yours. Even if you are the cheer coach................Just call Mom or Dad.

I fully expect that the next faculty meeting will cover other important and apparently not obvious facts like Breathing: Yes, It is Still Necessary, and, Clothing in Public Places: Why Pants are Always a Good Idea.

10/13/09

Hi! I'm so excited for fall! Fall is my favorite because I can wear boots! And Sweaters! I love leaves! Faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaallllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll. Decorations!

Oh. I'm sorry. Wrong Blog.

Sheeesh.

Anyway. I think I do a decent-enough job planning interesting lessons for my students. But I am fairly miserable about grading everything and entering it on the computer. I hate it. And I think keeping track of participation points is lame.

At lunch today, my department chair mentioned that in her 34 years of teaching, she has only met one teacher who was completely devoted to each of her classes, and each of her students. Said teacher was a middle-aged single woman who stayed at the school until 6 pm every night.

Crap.

I get annoyed when people imply I want to teach because something else didn't work out. For me, teaching was never the back-up plan. I decided to do this at age 16. This, the TEACHING is the plan.

So I will take every opportunity to do so. Even faker temporary teaching.

However, I am starting to realize that if next year there are still no jobs, I will have to do something else. This is hard to fathom when you have had a PLAN, the SAME PLAN since age 16.

10/8/09

1. Thanks to my sister Grace, I now have a ridiculously time/thought consuming activity for my Honors English students, who have thus far whipped through all of my lesson plans fairly effortlessly.

It isn't busy work, but hopefully it will take them longer than five minutes.

Grace helped by telling me some of the activities her teacher used while teaching Of Mice and Men.

The internet helped by giving me good ideas.

My evil brain helped by making said activity as challenging as possible.

bwahahahahahahaaaaaaaaaaaaa

2. A few nights ago, my Dad loaded up his trunk with pies from Marie Calendar's, and we delivered them to random people. And when I say random, I mean random. We drove around the neighborhood, and my dad would suddenly stop, point to a house, and say "Do you think they need pie?" Repeat until pies are gone.

That's how the drunk creepy guy who frequently screams at small children for trespassing got some Banana Cream goodness.

3. My youngest brother Clark gets weekly allergy shots. On days where my mother can't take him, I drive him to the clinic, and we go to lunch after. Today, both the clinic and Noodles and Co.* were filled with small children, or midgets, which is how Clark refers to anyone under five. Small children fascinate Clark, who did not grow up with four younger siblings.

"Look! A midget!"

"Holy Cow Steph! Look at how many there are!"

"It's like a convention!"

"I bet they're planning something..."

Someone needs to tell Clark that

a) Children and midgets aren't the same.

b) Midgets have adult brains, and are capable of planning a hostile take-over.

c) Toddlers and infants do not.

*We always go to Noodles, and Clark always orders the exact same thing. He takes ordering very seriously, and it amuses me. It also amuses me how Clark thinks I am a shut-in who grew up without electricity. Example: Hey, Steph, have you heard of a band called Radiohead?

10/6/09

Awhile ago, I blogged about Dan having to do a group-project, and I gleefully realized that I never had to do a group project ever again.* Joy.

Here are some other things I never have to do again. Extra joy.

1. First Dates.

2. Bull-sh*t my way through theory papers that I do not believe or support. I cannot tell you how many times I did this at Westminster. I believe in equitable and fair education. I do not believe I am inherently racist because I am white. I also do not believe I need to write out every single lesson plan, including a "script" of what I will say at the beginning of each class.

3. As a child-bride, living at home at the time of her engagement, I would be lying if I told you that the idea of not having to deal with a curfew, or anxious waiting-up mothers was very exciting. It's not the reason I got married, but it was a bonus. (Again, I met Dan at 19, I'm entitled to some teenager reactions.)**

4. Be engaged. Fun for the first month. I was engaged for 3.5.

5. Pretend to care about table settings for said wedding. I kept telling people to just "make it look pretty," or "make it taste good." I'm not bashing people who enjoyed planning their weddings, but it was not an important thing to me, and I'm glad all that stuff is over.

6. Try and find parking at the University of Utah.

7. Pretend to care about sports.

What are some things you no longer have to do? Does it make you unreasonably happy too?

* Sigh. This may or may not be entirely true. It is quite possible that there will be more formal education in my future. That may require me to interact with other humans. But since that may or may not be happening, and not any time soon, I am going to revel while I can.

Well, everyone, at this early hour, I'd like to discuss a adolescent literature book I kinda hated. Not totally hated, but kinda.

I'd post a picture of the cover for you, but I already tried doing that a thousand times, and it wouldn't work. There is a reason I don't post photos very often.

Oh, no, that time I pleased the blog gods, and it worked. Behold, Taken By Storm by Angela Morrison.

I'll start off by telling you that this is a Mormon Book. And that while I know that the author didn't select the cover, whoever did clearly abides by the blonde girl=chaste mentality Jack Weyland (see earlier post) so lovingly espouses. Anyway.

You see, Leesie, the main character, is a good Mormon girl living out in the Mission Field. (I believe it is Washington.) She doesn't have any friends in her school, since no one is LDS, and all non-LDS people do drugs, apparently. But fear not! Leesie is a senior, and determined to get into BYU, find her happily ever after husband, and leave her heathen high school peers behind. Thank goodness for BYU.

Then, Michael moves into town. Michael is NOT MORMON. Danger! Michael is also recently orphaned, and dealing with grief in a variety of self-destructive behaviors.

Shoot. I am making it sound like I totally hated this book, and I didn't. So let us back-track and talk about the good points of the novel.

1. Angela Morrison is a fairly decent writer. The book is co-narrated by both Leesie and Michael, and she is adept at creating two distinct voices, and the transitions between the two are quite graceful. Talent wise, Morrison could kick Weyland's trash.

2. Micheal's grief over his parent's death is realistically portrayed, and the writing allowed me to empathize with him as a reader, which is important. In fact, if the entire novel had been about Micheal, this post would be a lot different.

There. Done. Now we shall return to aspects of the novel that inspired the "kinda hate." Items are listed according to the level of annoyance they achieved, the first being the most mild.

1. BYU. Oh. My. Gosh. BYU is portrayed as impossible to get into, compared to Stanford academically, and as the only school where anyone has ANY standards whatsoever.**

Flip to the back cover. Who went to BYU? Angela Morrison. Oh, I see. Here's the thing. BYU is a good school. I know this. Here's the other thing. I was accepted to BYU twice. I could have never been accepted to Stanford. BYU is not Ivy League.

There are also lots of schools with learning environments conducive to people of the LDS faith. Morrison made it sound like anything outside of BYU was a party school, including BYU-I.

This little tidbit immediately triggered my radar for Negative LDS Stereotypes Often Found in LDS Literature. And said radar didn't stop blinking until I finished the novel.

2. Leesie very rarely mentions wanting to go to BYU for the academics. It is only to escape her High School of Whores and Drug Addicts, and find an eternal companion. Just once, I would have liked a passage where Leesie looks over a course catalog, or talks about what she might accomplish with her degree. Instead, you read alot about how the only way Leesie can meet her future husband is to get into BYU.

mini rant: COLLEGE IS FOR EDUCATION. THAT IS THE PRIMARY GOAL. MEETING PEOPLE/SPOUSES IS A BONUS, NOT A REASON TO ATTEND.

2a. It was really hard to believe that Leesie couldn't find any friends in her high school with high standards. LDS or not, logic dictates that even a small school in Washington will have nice girls to hang out with, and nice boys to go to dances with. Again, she lives in Washington, not Compton. There are lots of nice non-LDS people, I know this. I have met them. And Morrison should know this too.

3. According to Leesie, everything about Mormonism fits in a nice little box. For instance, in one of her poems (Did I tell you that a significant chunk of the book is written in the form of Leesie's poetry. Ooops. I think I buried that memory.*) she describes her future husband as blonde (the hair color of the righteous,) wearing a white button-down, wearing a CTR ring, and holding well-worn scriptures. In her fantasy, they chastely kiss (the B.O.M is between them....just kidding,) and live happily ever after. For Leesie, all Mormons look, and act the same. Furthermore, she also makes a lot of randomly offensive statements like "Mormons who marry non-Mormons always get divorced." Later, when Leesie and Michael go to a Stake dance together, Leesie insists that everyone is judging her, and that now no good LDS boys will date her because she is "fallen."

After bashing members as judgemental, and non-members as sinners, she is very surprised when Michael doesn't want to get baptized right away.

I still can't tell if Morrison was trying to make Leesie annoying as possible, or if Morrison believes this herself, but I would really like to see some LDS literature that depicts the complexities of being Mormon. Perhaps from the perspective of someone not raised in Salt Lake, not blonde, or maybe even from a family of combined faiths. Because there really are very few people who fit the mold described by Leesie and/or Morrison. So, heads up, writers: Mormons come in a variety of shapes and sizes.

Lastly,

4. Michael wants to have sex with Leesie. Leesie says no. Which is awesome. Hurray for standards! Hurray for not wantonly having sex! But her reasoning was very disturbing to me. She didn't want to sleep with Michael because if she did, she wouldn't get an ecclesiastical endorsement from her Bishop, and wouldn't be allowed to go to BYU.

Um. No.

Alternative ending:

Michael: Let's have sex!

Leesie: No thanks!

Michael: Why?

Leesie:Because I have a testimony of the gospel. I know Heavenly Father wants me to be happy, so he has given me commandments and standards to help me be happy, and return to him someday. Obeying my Heavenly Father and being happy in the long run is the most important thing to me. I make these choices because I believe in the gospel. ***

I guess the way Morrison wrote it made it sound like Leesie might have slept with Michael if BYU hadn't been in the picture, which seems insincere, and frankly, kind of lame. Combined with her desire to go to BYU for equally lame reasons, Leesie just seemed false.

I like my female role-models strong, sincere, and not afraid of making out.

(Again, though, I can't tell if Morrison is trying to depict Leesie as the hero, or if she is much more clever than I thought ((She did go to BYU,))and is depicting Leesie as the anti-hero. I don't know. It is much too meta for me. )

Anyway, I know this is super long (typing makes me tired, which is always the goal with long posts written after midnight.) I also know that a lot of people have read novel, and liked it, so note that my opinion is not the only one, or the most valid. And if you have read this book, and got a different impression, feel free to comment.

*Oh my gosh, the agony of teenage poetry. I know. I wrote some myself. Stab me in the eyeballs with my own chewed -on pen.

** I think this part bugged me more than normal, because I spent a lot of time with a girl who believed this to be true. I never stopped hearing about it. Actually said girl had a lot in common with Leesie, and I guess this is something that I should have mentioned before I started. If I read a book, and a character reminds me of a person I don't like, I will have a hard time liking the book, in general. There. Bias Noted. (Lately, but noted nonetheless.)

10/2/09

I hate grading papers. Well, not the actual reading through and dissecting content part, but the busywork part, entering grades into the computer, labeling things, boo.

I also hate the fact that recently, I've been excessively crabby, and not in the fun way. And that I feel like I haven't been able to communicate what is going on in my head. Much like my Sophomores and their attempts at a persuasive essay.

Anyway, in some strange internet wanderings, I came across an article discussing the difference between jealous and envious. It made me laugh, a little bit, because if you have spent ANY time around teenage girls, you will know that when conflict arises, at least one girl will bring up the jealousy card.

"You're jealous that I'm popular!"

"You're just jealous that I have a boyfriend and you don't!"

You're just jealous.

Sigh. Apparently, jealous is not the right word. To be jealous is to have something, and be afraid of someone taking it away. To be envious is to want something someone else has and that you don't have.

Clear?

And then I started wondering about my peers, my fellow child-brides who so often seem to be proclaiming their love for their very best husbands ever, almost as if they are afraid that if they don't, their title, their identity as Wife To The Best Husband Ever will be taken away.

And then I discovered that out in the internet somewhere, there is an honest-to-goodness contest for the Best/Cutest/Insert-Word-Here Husband. And that people are entering. And voting.

Of course every one's husband is the "best." That's why you married him.

So what's the point?

When did marriage become a competition?

Are my teenage students unintentionally right? Is everyone just jealous?In the correct sense of the word, of course.

My sewing machine is returned to me! (After giving up my future first-born, and arm, and a leg, mind you. It really is highway robbery, how much they charge for a tune-up these days....)

Anyway, I am very excited because from where I am, it is the weekend, (bless you, UEA,) and that means sewing can be added to my plans of eating too much food, sleeping a lot, and reading tons of teenager books.

Oh dear. As I was reading this, I was also responding to an email from my friend, in which we were being snotty elitists.

And now I am going to say something that will enrage the Child-Bride naysayers who accuse me of excessive egomania and intellectual snobbery (GUILTY. AS. CHARGED.)*

ready?

Being a teacher-aide is not the same as being a teacher.

It just isn't.

I'm not saying it isn't an important job, or a good job, or whatever, but the two positions are not the same. In a career where teachers are already under-valued and under-paid, the last thing we need taken away from us is our title. We worked hard for our degrees, and our license. **

End rant.

Happy about my machine. Annoyed with....other things.

* Just kidding. But, you could accuse me of a lot worse, honestly, and being "intellectual" and "elitist" is the LEAST of my problems. Plus, I don't think it is true anyways. I'm planning on watching TV and eating Chinese food tonight, not listening to NPR and making my own gnocchi. As for the egomania? Of course that is true. I write a blog, I didn't get here without a hefty dose of ego.

** Also, I would like to say that I know a lot of my MAT and other educator friends are not working right now, and I am only temporarily employed. I still consider them (and myself) teachers. Because they have their degree. And their licence. And can ostensibly (should the job market improve) be teaching in their own classroom whenever they want. Which an aide cannot do.